Open Access publication fund for books

The publication fund can cover the publication costs if you and your book fulfil the following conditions:

• You, the author/editor of the book submitted for funding, are a member of the University of Graz.

• You have an ORCID iD.

• The publication cannot be fully financed by third-party funds (for example, the Austrian Science Fund (FWF)).

• The publication is a primary publication in the form of an academic monograph or an anthology with a clear thematic focus.

• The quality of your publication will be assured through an appropriate review process, e.g. by an editorial board or by peer reviewers, including an independent external peer review by experts in the field.

• The publisher guarantees that your publication will be made permanently available online, worldwide and free of charge (Gold Open Access) immediately after publication, under a contractually ensured Creative Commons licence, and will receive a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) and an ISBN.

• The publication should be consistent with the "Empfehlungen zu Qualitätsstandards für die Open-Access-Stellung von Büchern" and listed in the Directory of Open Access Books.

• You have specified "Universität Graz" or "University of Graz" as your affiliation in the publication (see the affiliation guidelines). The support from the University of Graz is mentioned in an acknowledgement in your publication.

If you and your chosen publishers fulfil these conditions, please submit a funding application (online form on the intranet) including "Angaben zum Buch" (details of the book, form, pdf) and and at least one offer from a publisher, preferably two. Your chosen publishers should fill in the form Verlagsangebot für eine Open-Access-Buchpublikation (publishing offer for an Open Access book publication, pdf) in full. The submission deadline for decision-making is the 15th of each "odd" month (15/1, 15/3, etc.). Grants will be awarded subject to the availability of funds. The size of the grant will be decided on a case-by-case basis.

Applications should be submitted at least three months before the contract is signed. Please note that we cannot reimburse you for publication fees that you have already paid.

• Some publications are not eligible for funding, for example:

  • Festschriften
  • textbooks
  • non-fiction books for a non-academic audience
  • reprints
  • new editions
  • works of purely local interest, such as community and town chronicles

• In exceptional cases, dissertations may also be supported, provided they have been evaluated as "Very Good," are revised for book publication, peer-reviewed, and relevant to a broader professional audience. Qualification theses such as master's and bachelor's theses are published on the publication server of the University of Graz, unipub, and are not eligible for funding by the publication fund.

• Funding is awarded on a competitive basis, and there is no legal entitlement.

• Grants are available for two years from the date of approval.

• Every funded publication is also uploaded to the unipub repository.

• In contrast to Open Access and general publication costs, expenses for producing printed copies are not covered.

1. You submit an application with the necessary attachments. Please first complete the application for funding ("Antrag auf Kostenübernahme" online form on the intranet) and the "details of the book (pdf) and, if possible, obtain two publication offers (pdf) from different publishers.

2. The university will review the submitted proposals every two months. They will inform you and the cost centre named in the application (the head of the academic unit) whether the Open Access publication fund for books can provide funding and how much. If you are awarded a grant, the publication services will also send you the standard wording for acknowledging funding. You must ensure that the acknowledgement appears correctly in the publication.

3. You provide the publication services department with the publisher's contact details when they are ready to send you the invoice.

4. The University Library provides the publisher with the necessary billing information (based on the SAP purchase order - purchase order number and billing address).

5. The publisher sends the invoice with the required billing information to the central registry and postal administration or the designated mailbox. (If you receive the invoice directly from the publisher, please inform the publication services department and do not pay the invoice yourself!) The invoice will be processed through the standard electronic invoice workflow.

6. Any portion of the publication costs that exceeds the amount of the grant will generally be charged to the cost centre specified in the application. It is possible to split the costs between the University of Graz and other funding bodies.

7. You must inform the publication services department when your funded publication has been published. The publication will also be uploaded to the University of Graz publication server, unipub.